


(Blood) Ghost of the Past

by Sanguinifex (Eros_Scribens)



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age II, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Ficlet, Gen, Port from Tumblr, Red Lyrium, Red Lyrium Fenris
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-14
Updated: 2016-10-14
Packaged: 2018-08-22 08:31:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 517
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8279557
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Eros_Scribens/pseuds/Sanguinifex
Summary: AU: A chance event in the battle against Meredith changes the outcome at the Well of Sorrows.





	

**Author's Note:**

> This is almost canon for the Inquisition era of Blighted Blight-verse, but I'm going to expand on it there (whenever I actually get to it, I'm writing at least 2 fics about ancient darkspawn magisters first), and Samson's going to be there as well and he's not in this, etc minor changes. But I wanted to back this up off Tumblr, because I don't like having my work be at the mercy of Yahoo.

Fenris _had_ been unusually irritable during the flight from Kirkwall, but not really much more so than he usually was when wounded. It wasn’t even a bad wound, just a clip on the shoulder, but that Maker-dratted idol sword was apparently “like some kind of entropy weapon,” from what Varric had overheard, so Anders couldn’t heal it properly. And approximately half a second after Anders repeated that official medical opinion, on the third day out from Kirkwall, Varric’s knowledge of events ceased to be strictly “overheard,” because Fenris was yelling loud enough to be heard in Orlais.

“Well, if you can’t heal it, maybe you should have thought before blowing up a chantry and getting us into a battle with a madwoman with a cursed sword!”

“Meredith was going to call an Annulment before the year was out, the whole underground knew it. This way, we got to choose when. So we could get people out.”

“Well, I’m not a _mage_ , but I still got a sword in my fucking shoulder because of it and yOU CAN’T EVEN FUCKING FIX IT! I’m going to find myself a _competent herbalist_.”

With that, Fenris grabbed his pack and sword and turned back towards Kirkwall; and despite all his Carta and Coterie contacts, that was the last Varric heard or saw of Fenris for four years.

*************

For several months now the Inquisition had been tracking one of Corypheus’ generals, a horrific being who left its victims as unrecognizable shreds of flesh. The few who had seen this _thing_ and survived (apparently by escaping its notice) called it “The Blood Ghost.”

Cassandra and Cullen thought it was probably a possessed Red Templar, and had worked with Dagna to make a rune that ought to weaken it. So as Cassandra, Solas, Morrigan, the Inquisitor, and Varric walked down the stairs toward the Well of Sorrows, they thought they were ready.

What they found was a feral but entirely non-demonic creature, seemingly powered by red lyrium. It hissed; it threw chunks of searing red lyrium like grenades; it plowed through walls like butter; it teleported around the ruined courtyard; and it pulsed red, corrupted energy for twenty feet around it. The carefully-crafted rune was entirely useless.

Varric had run out of crossbow quarrels fifteen minutes ago, not to mention caltrops, throwing knives, and knockout powder, but it hardly mattered, because nothing he hit the creature with seemed to stick. Solas and Morrigan were on the ground, unconscious or dead, and the Inquisitor, who’d been more toward the edge of the red energy blast, was staffless and being violently sick. Cassandra stood leaning on her sword, barely holding up her shield, trying to catch her breath before another futile dash at the thing.

“Surrender now,” boomed the Blood Ghost–apparently it could talk–“give us the Well of Sorrows, and my master Danarius will be merciful to you.”

 _Danarius?_ In dawning horror, Varric realized that the creature’s ears were pointed, and that the spikes of red lyrium covering its body did not in fact grow in the random patterns found on Red Templars.

“…Fenris?”


End file.
